As expected, the planning committee of David Cameron's favourite council, Hammersmith and Fulham (H&F), last week approved plans to radically redevelop a 77-acre patch of inner west London - plans which include the demolition of 760 homes despite the strong opposition of people living in them, the destruction of the Earls Court exhibition centre despite the objections of the Association of Event Organisers, and despite a panel of architects H&F itself helped to appoint advising it to reject the plans.

The struggle over the Earls Court project, as the giant scheme is called, has been raging in earnest since 2009. The council has now embedded core components for its delivery. But its opponents have established bridgeheads too. One describes the situation in vivid terms: "From here on it's a fight to the death."

It would be rash to predict the outcome or the precise events that will precede it, but a timescale of key battles can be mapped. Next month, maybe sooner, a judge will decide whether an application for a judicial review into the scheme's legality launched by residents opposed to the demolition of their homes should proceed further.

Last December, Johnson's planning officers at the Greater London Authority (GLA) rejected earlier versions of the applications because they failed to comply with 44 policies of the mayor's London Plan, but suggested ways in which those failures might be addressed. These included "further information and discussion" on housing, "especially regarding estate renewal and affordable housing provision."

The words "estate renewal" mean the knocking down of those 760 homes in Hammersmith and Fulham and their promised replacement within the wider redevelopment area - a promise the scheme's opponents have doubts about. The GLA response also noted that the number of additional "affordable" homes included in the plans for the main development area was 740, representing about 14% of the total number of homes then proposed. This is very low percentage. A useful comparison might be made with the London Legacy Development Corporation's goal for "affordable" homes to be provided in the neighbourhoods of the Olympic Park - 35%, a figure described last month as being "in line with the mayor's London Plan."

Yet H&F's revised Earls Court project application still offers only 740 additional "affordable" homes. Given this, it is terribly tempting to suspect that the "further information and discussion" that the GLA suggested H&F should provide have resulted in an accommodation to enable the former to allow the latter to have its way. If so, it will mean Mayor Johnson being content that, according to my calculator, only 11% of the 7,583 new homes now being proposed for the project area as a whole will be additional "affordable" ones. Moreover, these will be the "intermediate" variety of "affordable" homes, rather than the less expensive social rent variety.

This may seem a strange state of affairs in a city gripped by a crisis of housing affordability. It will, however, not surprise seasoned followers of the Earls Court project saga. The previous job of Johnson's recently-appointed head of his new crime and policing office Stephen Greenhlagh was leader of H&F. Greenhalgh told the Guardian earlier this year that the Earls Court project is "the best deal in the history of redevelopment in London." Defending Greenhalgh against critics of the scheme back in 2010, Johnson described him as "the great man." Will Johnson use his planning powers to block or obstruct the ambitions of his fellow Tory Greenhalgh and his erstwhile colleagues at the flagship Tory borough? It seems rather unlikely.

However, a green light from the mayor to his allies in the boroughs won't be the end of the matter. The judicial review could be progressing, and further legal challenges cannot be ruled out. Moreover, the council's wish to sell the land on which those 760 homes stand - in two estates, the West Kensington and the Gibbs Green - to the developer Capco for demolition and redevelopment has to be approved by the government. This is unlikely to occur before next March, by which time a great deal might have changed - not least if police conclude that there is substance to allegations that people acting for the council have engaged in misconduct in relation to the scheme.

This long war is now becoming deeply attritional, yet its end may just about be coming into sight. Much, much more on all this to come...